I regret to have to report to the House the death of the right hon. Eric Forth, Member for Bromley and Chislehurst. I am sure that hon. Members in all parts of the House will join me in mourning the loss of a colleague and in extending our sympathy to the right hon. Member's family and friends.

May I ask the Leader of the House to give us the business for the coming week?

Before announcing the business for the week ahead, I wish to express my sorrow at the sudden death of the right hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Mr. Forth). The Conservative party has lost one of its stars and this House has lost a great parliamentarian. He brightened this place with his ties, his waistcoats and his love of country and western music, but above all with his personality. Eric served this Parliament with great distinction in many capacities, including on Committees, on the Speaker's Panel, in the Chamber and holding court in the Tea Room, offering advice to all comers, including myself—and very sage advice it was. But the House will recall particularly with great warmth Eric's weekly encounters with the late Robin Cook, when Robin was Leader of the House and Eric was the shadow Leader of the House. Each sharpened his wit on the other, to the great entertainment and elucidation of the rest of us. Our sympathies and prayers go to Eric's wife, Carroll, his three children, his friends and all his constituents.

The business for next week will be as follows:

Monday 22 May—Consideration in Committee and remaining stages of the Armed Forces Bill.

Tuesday 23 May—Progress on remaining stages of the Education and Inspections Bill.

Wednesday 24 May—Conclusion of remaining stages of the Education and Inspections Bill.

Thursday 25 May—Motion on the Whitsun recess Adjournment.

The provisional business for the week after the Whitsun recess will include:

Monday 5 June—Second Reading of the NHS Redress Bill [ Lords].

I thank the Leader of the House for giving us the business for the coming week and I echo the sentiments he expressed about my late right hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Mr. Forth). It was with deep shock and sadness that I and my right hon. and hon. Friends learned this morning of Eric's untimely death. Eric was a former shadow Leader of the House and his skirmishes each week with the late Robin Cook became legendary. Eric was above all a great parliamentarian, who loved this place and all it stood for. Never a man to pull his punches and not always beloved of the Whips or, dare I say it, Front Benchers, he was a great asset to this House. More than that, many in this House across all parties have lost not only a great colleague, but a friend. The life of this House will be the lesser for his passing. It was a mark of the man and his personality, to which the Leader of the House alluded, that the staff of the Tea Room expressed their tremendous sadness this morning, too. He had been a friend to them, not just to Members of Parliament. We have lost a great parliamentarian and we all mourn his loss. Our thoughts and prayers are with his wife, Carroll, and his family, friends and constituents.

I am sure that the Leader of the House is aware of the importance of a good conclusion to the Doha round of world trade talks, not only for this country, but for the whole developing world. May we have a debate on world trade so that we can explore the Government's position and ensure that they are putting sufficient pressure for the right conclusion of this round of trade talks on the European Trade Commissioner?

This week, it has been announced that 573 jobs will be lost at NHS Direct, in addition to the thousands of jobs being lost in hospitals across the country. May we have a statement from the Secretary of State for Heath on the future of NHS Direct?

However, that is not the only part of the NHS that is suffering financial problems. For example, the Thames Valley strategic health authority already gets 21 per cent. less funding than the average, and it has admitted that that has resulted in fewer operations and less patient care. In a presentation to the board last week, the SHA's chief executive revealed that introducing a national standard tariff across the NHS would mean that it would cost Thames Valley PCTs £70 million extra a year to provide the same services—there would be no gain in activity or in the services provided. That is just one example, so it is little wonder that people ask where all the money has gone. Therefore, may we also have a debate on the future funding of NHS trusts and the impact of the standard tariff?

That is the NHS that the Health Secretary said had had its best year ever—where on earth has she been? But that is not the only area where the Government are in denial. The head of the civil service has said of the Immigration and Nationality Directorate's work on asylum that it has "been performing particularly well", and the Prime Minster wrote to the incoming Home Secretary advising him to "continue and accelerate" the success of the Government's immigration and asylum policies.

That is the same Home Office where only 16 per cent. of officials have confidence in senior management. The director of enforcement and renewals at the immigration and nationality directorate was asked by the Home Affairs Committee how many people were in Britain illegally. He said:

"I haven't the faintest idea".

When asked how many people had been removed when all their appeal processes had been exhausted, he said:

"We don't track individual cases".

Therefore, can we have a debate on the chaos in the Government's prisons and immigration polices?

Perhaps that is why, in a recent speech, the Prime Minister revealed that he was asking the Chancellor to examine how the Treasury could be involved in ensuring the protection and security of the public. When asked if that meant that the Home Secretary would have to refer to the Chancellor before making any decisions, the Downing street spokesman said:

"No. The Home Secretary and the Chancellor will have a normal relationship".

Presumably, that will be in contrast to the relationship between the Chancellor and the Prime Minister. Up until now, the Chancellor has been the roadblock to reform, so can we have a debate in his future role in public sector reform?

Finally, in an article in the Eastern Daily Press, the sacked former Home Secretary said of the recent reshuffle:

"I thought the point was to give a clear sense of redirection for the Government but, in the end, it hasn't worked out like that."

So the former Home Secretary says that the Government lack direction, the Health Secretary is in denial, and the Home Office is in meltdown—no wonder this is a Government in paralysis.

I shall deal in turn with the points raised by the right hon. Lady. We are doing a great deal to apply pressure where that is required, as I can confirm from my five years as Foreign Secretary. We took the lead in the EU in pushing for an end to unacceptably high and restrictive subsidies to farmers across Europe. My right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary used to be Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and was in the lead in negotiating the deal on the future of the common agricultural policy.

In addition, we are also pushing the US and other key partners in the Doha round, and especially the much larger states from the non-aligned movement, such as India and Brazil. Those states must also make some movement, and especially in respect of non-agricultural market access. I assure the shadow Leader of the House that there will be an opportunity to debate these matters in the regular six-monthly debate due to take place just before the European Council in mid-June. That will be a full day's debate, and I hope that she and the rest of the House will take that opportunity to discuss the matters that she has raised and other key foreign policy issues coming up before the Council, such as Iraq, Iran and the funding of Hamas.

The right hon. Lady asks about the health service. She is not correct in claiming that thousands of people will lose their jobs under changes in NHS funding. She asks where the money has gone. It has gone, first, on dramatic increases in the number of clinical staff in the health service. Overall, there has been an increase of 85,000 in the total number of nurses in the health service, including an increase of nearly 3,000 in the health area covering her constituency.

Secondly, the money has gone on ensuring that nurses and other clinical staff are better paid. The number of nurses has increased by well over a quarter since 1997 and, alongside that, the pay of nurses, in real terms after inflation, has also increased by over a quarter.

Thirdly, the money has gone on new hospital buildings, to an astonishing degree, including in my constituency and in most constituencies in the country. Fourthly, it has gone on equipment. That is why there are difficulties with the health service—there always will be—but overall, on the question of whether the health service is doing the job for which the taxpayer is paying, yes it is, which is why levels of patient satisfaction are higher and why overall, on any measure, patients are receiving better care faster, and mortality and morbidity rates all show improvement.

The right hon. Lady asks about asylum and immigration. Asylum numbers are significantly lower than when we came into office in 1997. I have every reason to remember the catastrophic record of the right hon. and learned Member for Folkestone and Hythe (Mr. Howard), who had ordered a computer system, failed to finance it properly and, at a time when numbers of asylum seekers were rising, slashed by 1,200 the number of staff in the immigration and nationality department dealing with asylum seekers. On top of that, he had declared an amnesty in which 30,000 of those people were allowed to stay in the country without further proper inquiry.

Numbers are now down, and we have passed the tipping point where the numbers leaving the country are higher than the numbers applying to stay. We have reduced the time taken to process applications from20 months to about two months.

On the number of illegal asylum seekers, the Prime Minister reminded the House yesterday of the following:

"'There are no official estimates of the number of illegal immigrants into the United Kingdom. By its very nature, illegal immigration is difficult to measure and any estimates would be highly speculative.'"—[Official Report, 17 May 2006; Vol. 446,c. 991.]

That is what the right hon. and learned Member for Folkestone and Hythe said in 1995. There are slightly better estimates these days, following work by Professor Salt for the research and information directorate of the Home Office, who estimated that the total number of people who are wholly illegal was between 310,000 and 500,000. Those are not asylum seekers; we know how many asylum seekers there are.

I am glad to see the shadow Home Secretary sitting next to the right hon. Lady. Whatever other promises he makes at the next election about how life will be so much better when he becomes Home Secretary—that every prisoner will become compliant, every criminal will stop committing crime and, probably much easier to achieve, that there will be no illegal immigrants because they will be scared off by the disaster of the Conservative Government—I strongly advise him not to claim that he will be able to produce an accurate estimate of the total number of illegal immigrants. That would be very unwise, as he knows. Why? Because people who are wholly illegally in this country, as in every other country, have escaped immigration control and thus, by definition, do not appear on any database. No country in the world has accurate figures for wholly illegal immigration: not the United States and not the country held up as having the greatest and most efficient system of law and order in Europe—if not the highest respect for human rights—namely, France. The French have hundreds of thousands of people who are "sans papiers." They do not know the numbers and they do not take much interest in them.

I am sure that my right hon. Friend knows that the Government have done an awful lot to recognise the tremendous contribution of our war veterans. As we approach veterans day, will he use his good offices to ensure that we reward the land army and the Bevin boys?

Yes, I will certainly use my good offices in that respect and talk immediately to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Defence and the Minister with responsibility for veterans.

From these Benches, may we join the tributes to Eric Forth? Business questions was his natural stage, and one on which he always excelled. Even at his most provocative, he was never less than entertaining and never less than perceptive. No one was ever in any doubt what Eric Forth thought about anything, and behind the undoubted style there was real substance. He was an ornament to the House, and he will be sorely missed.

May we have an urgent debate on nuclear power in this country? It is clearly no good waiting for the results of the energy review, because the Prime Minister has transparently decided to pre-empt the results of that review. Therefore, given the reservations that have been expressed, quite openly, by a former Minister in the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and the fact that the Treasury has said that the costs are likely to be eye-wateringly large, is it not time that the whole House had an opportunity to debate the matter?

If and when orders are introduced for the regionalisation of police forces—given the difficulties that have been experienced over recent days in Wales, that may not happen—can they be brought before the whole House, so that all hon. Members have the opportunity to raise the issues that are relevant to our constituencies?

It was two weeks ago, I think, that the Government was reshuffled, but still no list of ministerial responsibilities is available. Can the Leader of the House sort that out? We apparently now know what the Deputy Prime Minister is doing, but it would be nice to see which Ministers feel that they have which responsibilities, so that we can perhaps hold them to account rather better than we would otherwise.

Lastly, may we have a debate on the Human Rights Act 1998? Two weeks ago, the problem was the then Home Secretary; now it seems that everything is down to the exercise of the Human Rights Act. Frankly, the Prime Minister has been saying some very silly things about that Act over recent weeks. Given that some of us believe that the finest achievement of the Leader of the House, when he was Home Secretary, was to introduce the Human Rights Act, may we have a debate to defend the reputation of that Act and of the right hon. Gentleman?

On nuclear power, I cannot promise when there will be a debate on the issue, but the energy review will be published and then, in due course, there will be a debate on this country's future energy needs, including the role that nuclear power should play. Let me point out to the hon. Gentleman that people forget that nuclear energy currently plays an extraordinarily important part in energy generation. It accounts for 75 —[ Interruption ]—terra-watt hours. I am learning.

Explain!

I am very happy to explain, but afterwards. That is 20 per cent. of total electricity generation. The hon. Member for Somerton and Frome (Mr. Heath) will know that, because of the decline in North sea production of gas in particular and oil, unless we take other steps to rebalance the generation of energy, including nuclear power, we will become quite unnecessarily reliant on overseas sources of energy. He will also know that the idea that renewables could possibly replace the loss of generating capacity from nuclear power is simply not the case. Even in a country such as Germany that has huge numbers of wind farms—far more than I think would ever be found acceptable here; its generation of electricity by wind is only a third of that generated by nuclear power in this country.

On the regionalisation of police forces, the orders will go through the House in the normal way. I cannot recall the procedure exactly, but I think that many of them will be taken upstairs. On the reorganisation of police forces, I know, as a former Home Secretary—everybody in the House knows it—there is simply no necessary connection between the efficiency of a police service, the degree to which the service is delivered at a local level and the overall size of the constabulary. Moreover, the current boundaries were in effect settled following the royal commission report on the police in the early 1960s. Forty years on is not too short a time to reconfigure police force boundaries to take account of the dramatic changes in our social structure in the meantime.

On a list of ministerial responsibilities, there are in the Library of the House and available on the website letters that my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister has sent to each departmental Minister setting out responsibilities. The detailed list of ministerial responsibilities will be published in the normal way. However, having watched oral questions every day since I became Leader of the House, I cannot say that the absence of the list has caused any difficulty whatsoever to either Ministers or Members.

On the Human Rights Act, the hon. Gentleman says that it was the finest thing that I ever did as Home Secretary. If he does not mind, I would like to say that it is one of the finest of a long list. Future historians of the Home Office may say that the finest thing that I ever did as Home Secretary was to survive four years.

We have been here four years since you got up.

Five.

There needs to be a proper debate about the Human Rights Act. That is what we are proposing. Following 11 September, the circumstances today are very different from those anticipated at the time of the passage of the Act. There are some who say that the Human Rights Act is a problem; there are others who say its interpretation is a problem. Let us not throw the baby out with the bathwater, but look sensibly—which is what the Prime Minister wants—at how the Act is working and whether it or its interpretation should be changed.

Might we find time to debate the extent to which the tabloid virus is beginning to infect BBC television news? Has the Leader of the House noticed that newscasters increasingly no longer read news to camera, but walk around the studio like a couple of ham actors emoting? I think that it is called news with attitude. Did he notice that last night's 6 o'clock television news was cynically edited to delete the fact that the Prime Minister, inhis reply to the right hon. Member for Witney(Mr. Cameron), quoted the right hon. and learned Member for Folkestone and Hythe (Mr. Howard)? That had to be reinstated—no doubt after complaints—in the 10 o'clock news bulletin. Does he agree that if the BBC cannot do better than that, it is going to have difficult, justifying its licence fee?

Editorial decisions of the BBC are for the BBC and, to make a serious point, cannot be for the House. However, I will make sure that my hon. Friend's remarks are passed on. On the issue of whether newscasters should prance around studios or sit at a desk and read the news—that is what it seems to me they are paid for, and paid too much—personally I prefer the latter to the former. On the issue of accuracy, all journalists, including those at the BBC, have a responsibility to ensure that quotations are attributed accurately.

As Eric Forth's neighbouring MP in Bromley, may I just say a few words in addition to the very fine tributes by the Leader of the House and the shadow Leader of the House? As they have said, he will be mainly remembered as a stout defender of the role of the House of Commons and a great House of Commons man. Not everyone in the House may realise, as I did as his neighbour, that, in many ways, he was an old softie at heart. The comments made by the shadow Leader of the House about the reaction in the Tea Room reinforced that. He was a very good neighbour to me and when I faced some difficulty in the last general election, he was the first to come and help out. He was there early in the morning; no nonsense, getting on with it and saying, "I will deliver anything you want." The House may like to know that, in Bromley, he was regarded with great affection, as well as great respect, for an outstanding independence of spirit. He will be greatly missed.

Allow me to say that we all share in the hon. Gentleman's tribute. As Eric's neighbour, he has good reason to know of the affection in which Eric was held by his constituents, as well as by the House.

May I associate myself fully with all the eloquent tributes that have been paid to the late Eric Forth? He will be greatly missed.

May we have a debate, as a matter of urgency, on the decision of the local health authority in Leicester to cut £161 million from the pathway project? Although I accept everything that the Leader of the House has said about the amount of money that has gone into the health service in Leicester, both the Secretary of State for Health, my right hon. Friend the Member for Leicester, West (Ms Hewitt) and I, in our last manifestos, specifically mentioned the amount of money to be spent on refurbishing our three hospitals. That is now going to be cut, which will mean that the hospitals cannot be refurbished. May we please have an urgent debate on this important issue?

My hon. Friend has put the position of the NHS in Leicester in context. There has been a significant improvement in funding in Leicestershire. The number of nurses is up 1,600 in the health authority area, there are nearly 700 more doctors, including 250 more consultants, and a lot of capital investment. I cannot promise him a debate on the Floor of the House, but there are many opportunities to raise the matter on the Adjournment, including in Westminster Hall, and I hope that he will take them. As his next-door neighbour, I am sure that the Secretary of State for Health is fully aware of the issue; indeed, I know that she is.

I associate myself with the many tributes to the late Eric Forth. He had a great love of and respect for this House and he will be missed by us all; especially those of us who sat within hearing range of his occasional sedentary comments.

May I give the Leader of the House an opportunity to distinguish himself above those who have previously held his office by addressing an issue that has yet to be satisfactorily addressed as far as the Northern Ireland Grand Committee is concerned? It appears that there are one or two Members—perhaps three—who are vetoing the idea of the Northern Ireland Grand Committee meeting in Northern Ireland. A meeting of the Grand Committee is being arranged. Will the Leader of the House use his influence to ensure that it takes place in the Province?

I will indeed use my good offices in that respect to see what can be done to ensure that there is a venue for the Grand Committee in Northern Ireland. I thank the hon. Gentleman and his colleagues for, as I understand it, attending the recent British-Irish Parliamentary Union. I accept the point that he makes and I will pursue it with my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland.

May I also associate myself with the tributes to the late Mr. Forth?

May I ask my right hon. Friend about the case involving the death of a young boy in a secure training centre and the inability to raise that matter in the House because of a two-year delay in holding the inquest? There are indications now that the inquest may be put off until next year and there are unconfirmed reports of a further serious incident in a secure training centre. Will he look into the continuing lack of effective scrutiny in this place of that important subject?

Yes, and I understand the distress that has been caused to that young person's family, but also to my hon. Friend and her constituents more widely. There is a problem about the procedure relating to coroners. There is a Coroners Bill, which I think is currently before the other place. It will not solve all the problems, but it should solve many. It will modernise the coroners system. I know from my experience as Home Secretary just how traumatic such cases can be and, of course, I will discuss the matter further with her.

May I also associate myself with the previous comments about Eric Forth? He was a most independent-minded Member and a splendid example to us all.

I appreciate the fact that the new Leader of the House bothers to attend debates and statements. He came to the Opposition day health debate and noted my disgust that the Secretary of State for Health refuses to grapple with the situation in Shropshire in which early-stage breast cancer sufferers with Cheshire, Staffordshire or Welsh addresses can get Herceptin on the NHS paid out of their taxes, while those with a Shropshire address have to pay £47,000. I have raised the matter on several occasions at business questions. Will the Leader of the House please try to get the Secretary of State to come to the Chamber and answer questions directly, or, even better, effect a meeting between me and the Secretary of State? We now have the horror of breast cancer sufferers being camped out overnight at the primary care trust offices. The situation is dreadful and, in a civilised society such as ours, intolerable, so I would be most grateful if the new Leader of the House would intervene on it.

As the hon. Gentleman mentions, I was indeed present for the Opposition day debate on the health service. I listened carefully to the opening speeches made by the Opposition spokesman and by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Health. The hon. Gentleman's criticisms of the way in which my right hon. Friend responded to the question are not justified. As I sat next to her, she tried to address the difficult issue. I understand the hon. Gentleman's concern and that of his constituents, and I think that there is about to be some clarification on Herceptin. However, if I am wrong about that, I will of course write to him and put a note about that in the Library.

Everyone in the House has to recognise that when new drugs are developed or are specific to not only conditions such as cancer, but certain stages of cancers, there will be fine judgments to be made about when and where they ought to be used. I think that that is the problem with respect to Herceptin, but that said, and although I think that the hon. Gentleman's criticism was uncalled for, I will discuss the matter further with my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State.

I do not know whether my right hon. Friend has been following with interest the demutualisation of Standard Life. If, like me, he is a member, he will have been inundated with pro-demutualisation material. The ballot makes a local authority stock transfer look positively balanced and objective. Is it not about time that having set standards for the asset lock, the House has the opportunity to debate such demutualisations so that there is balance in the way in which they are performed?

I do not think that I am a member of Standard Life—I am sure that I would know if I was—but I have been a member of other mutual societies, so I entirely recognise what my hon. Friend is saying. I accept, too, his case that there ought to be a better balance. I know of his distinguished record as a member of the Co-operative party, and I will raise the matter with my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry.

I agree with what has been said about Eric Forth. He was an awkward customer and if he was here today, he would undoubtedly be the one person who would dissent from the otherwise unanimous enthusiasm for his achievements in the House.

Will the Leader of the House confirm that it is quite remarkable that a year after the general election, we have yet to have a debate on the Floor of the House about Iraq? That is a country in which British troops continue to die and it poses for the Government their greatest foreign policy dilemma, so, recognising that he will no longer have to reply to such a debate, will he show a little more enthusiasm about having one?

As a matter of fact, I was very enthusiastic about having such a debate. As I told the House last week, I was putting in requests to the former Leader of the House for a debate on Iraq, Iran and the middle east more generally. Iraq has been discussed on the Floor of the House on many occasions, although, as far as I recall, the right hon. and learned Gentleman is correct in saying that a formal debate on Iraq has not been flagged up over the past year. There will be an opportunity next week further to discuss Iraq in the context of the Armed Forces Bill. As I said in reply to the right hon. Member for Maidenhead (Mrs. May), there will be another opportunity to discuss it in the middle of June in the debate on the European Council. As Iraq will be before the Council, I believe that it will be entirely in order to debate it at length.

One of the biggest challenges facing the United Kingdom and the world is climate change. Under the UN framework convention on climate change, the UK has a commitment to mitigate emissions and make progress on adaptation—dealing with effects. The Government have a good and enviable record on mitigating emissions, but their record on dealing with effects and adapting to the inevitable climate change that is coming is, frankly, woeful. We have done almost nothing to adapt to the situation. Greenhouse gases and the greenhouse effect have been known about for more than 30 years and the European Union is to produce a Green Paper on the matter by the end of the year, but we are in danger of fiddling while the world burns. May we have a debate by the end of October, bearing in the mind the EU deadline, on dealing with the effects of climate change?

We have just had Environment questions, but I will do my best to ensure that there is a debate by the end of October—my hon. Friend seems to make a reasonable request. However, I resist his criticism of our record. I cannot recall any Government in the industrialised world who have been more in the lead on trying to tackle climate change than the British Government. Our right hon. Friend the Prime Minister put the matter right at the top of the G8 agenda, not because it was an easy subject or comfortable for other G8 partners, but precisely because the subject was difficult and he believed that all G8 partners needed to do more on climate change—he actually forced them to do so. I could give my hon. Friend all the numbers. He said that we have cut emissions. Our scheme reduced emissions by 1.5 million tonnes between 2002 and 2004. However, this is an international problem. Even if we were to abolish our emissions altogether, without international action by other parties, including, especially, the United States, China and India, we would be making only a marginal contribution. We are in the lead and the matter is a profound priority for the Government.

All Prime Ministers who have been in office for many years become worn out, start to make mistakes, blame other people, start to fire their senior colleagues and lose touch with reality. Would the Leader of the House favour rushing through legislation to put a maximum term limit on a Prime Minister of nine years?

No. That would be a bad career move for the Prime Minister, and suggesting it would be a much worse career move for the Leader of the House. The hon. Gentleman's knowledge of history is slightly defective. Plenty of successful Prime Ministers have indeed gone on and on and on.

Will my right hon. Friend set time aside to discuss counterfeit drugs? My constituency has the main transporter of drugs to the Scottish health service, pharmacies and hospitals. I was shocked last week to find out that there are 2,400 sites on the internet supplying drugs. It is reckoned that 80 per cent. of those drugs are counterfeit. A man was arrested in London last year who had a lab in his kitchen that was capable of producing 1 million tablets a day. Ten years ago, there were only seven transport companies distributing drugs throughout the United Kingdom, but today there are more than 400. It is very easy to set up such a company. One pays £1,500 for a licence and—

Order. The House has got the gist of the argument.

The illegal production of illicit drugs and the counterfeit production of drugs that are otherwise lawful is a serious problem. I am glad that my hon. Friend has raised it and I, in turn, will raise it with my right hon. Friends the Secretary of State for Health and the Home Secretary.

May I bring the Leader of the House back to the subject of nuclear power, which was raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Somerton and Frome (Mr. Heath)? The need for an urgent debate on the subject was illustrated by the right hon. Gentleman's answer, in which he managed to ignore microgeneration and energy efficiency measures, both of which would be interfered with by a decision to go nuclear. Will he comment on the view that seems to be coming from Downing street that that vastly important and potentially dangerous change in energy policy might be achieved without primary legislation? Will he ensure not only that there is a full debate in the House on the change, but that the House has an opportunity to vote on it?

The legislative base for any increase in nuclear generating capacity will of course be clear, but there is little point in the House wasting its time legislating in respect of powers that already exist. It is a classic Liberal Democratic approach: never mind the demands for new laws that are needed; let us debate laws that are not needed. There will of course be debates on the energy review and the White Paper when it is published.

The hon. Gentleman represents Cambridge, which is one of the key bases of this country's scientific establishment, where much of the work on nuclear energy was developed—

And renewables.

And renewables. I have to say that I would find the Liberal Democrats' claims that they oppose all nuclear and want only renewables more convincing if, at local level, they were more consistent in respect of planning permission for wind farms. I recollect that they oppose almost all planning applications for wind farms and for developments of other renewable sources of energy.

As a fellow Scot, I associate myself with all the comments on the late Eric Forth. If there is life after death, I can look forward to enjoying exchanges with him and the late Robin Cook.

A former Member of this House who is still a Member of the other place was given a lengthy prison sentence for acting irresponsibly and endangering people's lives, but when company directors act irresponsibly and not only endanger people's lives, but cause their employees and other people to lose their lives, they are given a paltry fine, which is probably tax deductible. What are the Government doing to end that unfair and inconsistent practice and to right that wrong?

I thank my hon. Friend for his question. In fact, a quite high level of responsibility is imposed on company directors, and that has increased. Whether we should amend the law in respect of corporate manslaughter is a separate issue, and my hon. Friend may be aware that our right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for the Home Department has plans to do that. He is considering legislation, but is anxious to ensure that it is fair both to victims and potential victims and to company directors.

May I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his handsome and generous tribute to my right hon. Friend the late Eric Forth? As others have said, the important thing about Eric Forth is that he was deadly serious about defending the rights and freedoms that over the generations this House has hard won from over-mighty Executives, and he believed, rightly, that we should do that better. We shall genuinely miss him.

The Leader of the House will, I am sure, have heard that I am to chair a big public meeting in East Grinstead tomorrow night as part of the formal consultation on the Government's wicked plan to impose excess further housing in the south-east of England. Does he agree that, by any stretch of the imagination, the scale of the developments is clearly in breach of the Government's own benchmark for sustainability? Given the points made by my hon. Friend the Member for East Surrey (Mr. Ainsworth) yesterday in his urgent question on the water supply, and given the inadequacy of the roads and railways and the fact that public services in the area are extremely overstretched, will the right hon. Gentleman ensure that we in this House have a chance to debate the infrastructure's inability to keep up with the Government's plans for increased house building in the south of England, particularly in Mid-Sussex?

First, I thank the hon. Gentleman for his tribute in respect of Eric Forth. The reason why the tributes have been so full is that Eric Forth cared about this place. In my judgment, caring about Parliament is not a matter of sentiment; it is absolutely fundamental to the working of our democracy and to good government.

Of course I had heard that the hon. Gentleman is to speak at the meeting tomorrow night. I am pleased to say that the news had even reached Blackburn, and I believe that train reservations are in hand.

I noticed a flicker of a smile cross the hon. Gentleman's lips as he described the plans as "wicked". Let me say to him and to other Members—particularly Opposition Members—who represent rural and suburban constituencies in the south-east that nothing would please Environment Ministers more than if no plans were necessary to increase the number of available houses in the south-east. The truth is, however, that demand for housing in the south-east greatly exceeds supply. I wish that many of the hon. Gentleman's constituents would recognise the attractions of the north-west, including my Blackburn constituency, and move there, but they are not going to. The choice for the Government, for him, for his local authority and for every other Member of the House is between allowing a dramatic and continuing increase in house prices to squeeze out the very people who need to live in those areas, and ensuring a sensible increase in housing so that prices decrease and those who live in those areas are able to stay there. That is the choice, and the debate is not helped by the use of extravagant adjectives. Every house in the country was new at one time.

Eric Forth was a close personal friend and I am deeply distressed by his early passing. Hon. Members right across the House have rightly paid generous tribute to him, and that is well merited. May I ask the Leader of the House, who gave a most generous personal tribute, to arrange a debate on how the authority of this House and the authority of the Government and the Executive might be rebalanced? There could be no better tribute to the late Eric Forth than to redress the balance between the Executive and Back-Bench Members of the House of Commons.

I know of the close friendship between the hon. Gentleman and Eric Forth. Both could often be found in the Tea Room talking about over-mighty Governments, particularly during the period of the Major Government.

The hon. Gentleman, as a former Chairman of the Procedure Committee and a member of the Modernisation Committee, will know that there are many opportunities to debate that subject. He will also know that, in a public session of the Modernisation Committee yesterday, we received evidence from three academics, one of whom made the point that the accountability of Ministers to Parliament had been strengthened significantly in the past 50 years, not least through the introduction 25 years ago of the Select Committee process. I am strongly in favour of improving the accountability, and the perception of accountability, of Ministers, but we must not believe that the position has worsened in the past 50 years when, in fact, it has got significantly better.

On BBC2's "Newsnight" last night, the Minister for Immigration, Citizenship and Nationality said that it would take at least 10 years to clear the backlog of illegal immigrants in this country. Residents of my Kettering constituency and elsewhere think that it is scandalous that those in government who are supposed to defend our country and protect our borders seem to be completely unable to do so. I join my right hon. Friend the Member for Maidenhead (Mrs. May) in calling for an urgent debate on immigration and asylum in this country.

There are plenty of occasions to debate that issue, but if the Opposition feel really exercised about it they have a number of Opposition days coming up, which I am sure that they will put to good use. [ Interruption. ] I see the Opposition Chief Whip confirm that. I am always happy to suggest subjects to the Opposition for their debating time.

I point out to the hon. Gentleman that my hon. Friend the Minister for Immigration, Citizenship and Nationality gave that time scale because of the time that it will take to introduce the e-borders arrangements, so that we have accurate data on the numbers going in and coming out of the country.

I hope that the hon. Gentleman tells his constituents that in 1996 the then Home Secretary, the right hon. and learned Member for Folkestone and Hythe(Mr. Howard), decided to abandon disembarkation controls in Dover and other ports, which covered about 40 per cent. of those leaving the country. He also got rid of all the staff and the budget for them. When I became Home Secretary, it was clear that there was no point in maintaining embarkation controls in respect of the other 60 per cent. because people who wanted to leave illegally would go through the other ports. The system that the Conservatives had maintained meant that even when disembarkation cards were taken off people, they were put in a room and nothing was done with them.

We must change the system, and that is what the Government are seeking to do. I wish that there had been slightly more help from the Opposition in respect of part of these arrangements, especially on identity cards.

I associate myself and my hon. Friends with the glowing tributes to Eric Forth. When showing new Members round the House, I would always point out Eric Forth, and the description "colourful character" would always feature.

I do not know whether the Leader of the House saw the programme on the BBC over the weekend that showed that 52 per cent. of the British public believe that Scottish Members should no longer be able to become Prime Minister. I am certainly sure that it was not missed by No. 11. Does not this show that the public are way ahead of the House and the Government in their thinking about the role of Scottish Members? Should we not have a proper, grown-up debate about the role of us Scots MPs so that we get up to speed with the public on this issue?

The hon. Gentleman has a particular view—he would like to see Scotland separated from the rest of the United Kingdom. That is not the view taken by the vast majority of people in Scotland, nor is it the view taken by the vast majority of people in the United Kingdom. We should celebrate our Britishness. A Prime Minister is the Prime Minister for the entire United Kingdom—that is Great Britain, including Scotland and Northern Ireland. It seems to me that where he or she happens to come from is entirely irrelevant.

May I also associate myself with the tributes that have been paid to Eric Forth? He was a politician who always made himself available to new Members to give them, as he would put it, good advice.

You have probably read, as I have, Mr. Speaker, the interview of the Leader of the House in The Times of two days ago. I welcome the right hon. Gentleman's aspirations about petitions receiving a certain amount of action rather than just a response. Will he extend that principle to popular early-day motions, which currently receive no Government response or debate in the House?

The petitions proposal is not an original proposal from me; it has been around for a while. I understand that the Scottish Parliament has a good system in place for dealing with petitions that are signed by a significant number of Members. It was my instinct to raise the matter before the Modernisation Committee and, subject to what colleagues on that Committee and other Members believe to be right, to ensure that we take more seriously petitions that are often painstakingly drawn up, with the support of many constituents and other people throughout the country. I think that that is straightforward.

An inquiry is taking place into the future of early-day motions. That is a matter for the House and certainly not one for the Government. It is a tricky issue because they are used for serious national issues, serious constituency issues and trivial issues such as the success or failure of Burnley football club.

As a new Member, I would like to associate myself with the tributes to Eric Forth. He was unfailingly kind to those of us who were elected last year. I will miss his ready wit and his robust advice.

Now that the Government have reinstated structures in the national health service that they got rid of eight years ago, can we have a debate to reflect the real concerns of health practitioners in our constituencies who are concerned about the culture of continual change in the NHS. They just want a period of calm. They would like us to have the opportunity to reflect that in Parliament in the presence of Ministers. May we have such a debate?

I welcome all debates on the national health service—on what we have done nationally and on what happens locally. I hope very much that in such debates, Opposition Members, including those who are new, will be honest enough to talk about the state that the NHS would have been in had Conservative spending plans continued, and had the Government accepted their advice when each year—almost without exception—they voted against the spending plans proposed by my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer. If Conservative spending plans had continued, there would not have been the dramatic increase in the numbers of nurses, doctors and other clinicians—there has been an 85,000 increase in the number of nurses. There would also not have been a dramatic increase—it was increased by more than a quarter—in the real pay of nurses. Instead, there would have been the same stagnation in the health service, and, as a result, there would have been lower delivery of care for the hon. Gentleman's constituents and for the constituents of every other Member of this place.

rose—

Order. I will remember next week those hon. Members who have not been called today.

On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. Yesterday I received a reply from the Minister for Energy to a letter that I wrote to the Prime Minister about nuclear power. His letter said that the outcome of the energy review has not been pre-determined and that no decisions have been taken on the need for new nuclear power stations. He said that it was a genuine energy review. That is at odds with what the Prime Minister has stated. It is clearly essential that hon. Members are given—

Order. That is not a matter for the Chair. I am not responsible for what any Minister has to say, whether it be the Prime Minister or any other Minister. The hon. Gentleman will have to take up the matter—the contradictions—with the Ministers concerned.

On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. On the Order Paper today there is notice of a written ministerial statement on the Royal Mail. You may have heard the content of the statement being discussed on the "Today" programme this morning. I wonder whether that was with some foreknowledge that the House did not possess.

I understand that there was a written statement. Information has been given to the House and it is available in the Vote Office.

I beg to move

That, in the opinion of this House, the following provisions shall be made with respect to the salaries of Members of this House, including the additional salaries determined in accordance with the Resolutions of this House (as amended from time to time) of 30th October 2003 relating to Pay for Chairmen of Select Committees (No. 2) and 13th July 2005 relating to Pay for Chairmen of Standing Committees (No. 2)—

For the year starting with 1st April 2006 the yearly rate shall be increased in two stages—

(a) with effect from 1st April, by 1 per cent., and

(b) with effect from 1st November, to the yearly rate determined in accordance with the Resolution of this House of 10th July 1996 relating to Members' Salaries.

With this we will consider the two motions on the pay of Chairmen of Select Committees.

The motion on Members' salaries will give effect to the proposal announced by my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister on 30 March that the pay increases for Members of Parliament for 2006-07 should be staged, with the full increase being deferred until 1 November rather than being payable from 1 April last. The proposal is made in the context of the Government's response to the 28th report of the Senior Salaries Review Body, which provides that the award to the senior civil service, to which Members' pay is linked under the formula agreed in 1996, is being staged in a similar way.

Under the decisions taken in 2003 and 2005, annual uprating of the additional salaries for Select and Standing Committee Chairmen is also linked to the senior civil service pay bands. The motion accordingly provides that the increase in these salaries too should be staged.

Under these proposals, the salary of a Member of Parliament will be £59,686 from 1 April and £60,277 from 1 November. The principle of linkage to the senior civil service pay bands, agreed by the House in 1996, followed earlier systems of linkage. It was intended to avoid the need for a major debate on Members' pay on every occasion when pay needed to be adjusted. However, the system agreed does not cover the present situation, because the pay bands to which our pay is linked would have risen by the full 2 per cent. from 1 April. If nothing further were done, our pay would rise by 2 per cent. from that date, even though this would not be the case in practice for most of the senior civil service.

When he proposed this staging of the senior civil service pay increase, my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister announced that it was to

"reflect what is affordable within expenditure plans."

I accept that the total saving to the public purse from the staging of the pay of Members of Parliament itself will be relatively small. It amounts to less than £230,000 in basic pay, and a little more than that if other factors—employers' national insurance contributions and Exchequer pensions contributions—are included.

I hope that colleagues agree that we ought to play our part and show restraint, as we are asking the senior civil service, to whose pay ours is linked, to show equal restraint.

As the House knows, the Senior Salaries Review Body has made some critical recommendations on Members' pay, and it has established comparators in both the public and the private sectors. Does the Leader of the House accept that Members' pay is 20 per cent. behind the comparators to which it has been linked by the SSRB? Is that fair in the short, medium or long term for hon. Members? Will it encourage good, competent, able, intelligent people to put their names forward as Members of Parliament?

I accept the point that the hon. Gentleman is making, and I shall deal with the wider review of Members' pay that will take place next year. As comparable pay in the private sector has risen much faster than pay for senior civil servants, they too are out of kilter with the comparators, so I accept the strength of that argument.

In its review next year the SSRB must take account of the extent to which pay levels act as a disincentive, deterring good people in all walks of life from serving in the House. It is important that Members of Parliament be paid properly, and—as members of all parties aspire to hold office—that should include Ministers. At the same time, however, I am struck by the high calibre of members of all parties who entered the House in 2001 and 2005, notwithstanding the pay and the cynical press that Members of Parliament generally receive. However, if pay does not keep pace with the comparators, particularly as the pressure on Members of Parliament to serve full-time is much greater than it was when the hon. Member for Macclesfield (Sir Nicholas Winterton) and I came to the House almost three decades ago—

It was more than three decades ago, in my case.

Indeed. In those circumstances there will be a disincentive, deterring good people not only from entering the House but, if they do enter it, from staying .

Will the Leader of the House confirm that it is mandatory for the SSRB to hold that review, as there appears to be some doubt in its mind?

I have been handed a note saying that the broader questions will be dealt with in the SSRB's triennial review, which is due in 2007. If I am wrong—and I intend to talk to the chairman shortly—I will make that known to the House. However, I have every reason to believe that there will be a full review next year—and that view is being confirmed by the nods of officials in the Box.

It might be more appropriate to confirm this at the end of the debate or afterwards, but what is the date of the triennial review? I understand that it was due to take place this year rather than next year.

I shall certainly confirm the date for the right hon. Lady.

May I point out that Members of Parliament are in a unique position? Members entering the House for the first time—there were many such Members at the last election—receive the same pay as a Member of Parliament who has served in the House for 25, 30, 35 or even 40 years. It is important that Members' pay keep pace with the comparators, otherwise there is a grave unfairness for Members who serve with loyalty and distinction in the House. I include the Leader of the House in that category.

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman. I have received a note saying that the review was to be commissioned this year, and will report next year. I have rather fewer complaints about my pay because, as I am a member of the Cabinet, it is a little more than the hon. Gentleman's. I hope that the review will look at the issue of whether there should be an age and experience-related band, as it is perfectly possible to construct a series of steps—

Oh, no.

Hang on a sec. It is perfectly possible to construct a pay system in which Members are paid according to age and time spent in the House. Whether that is acceptable to the public purse, and above all to hon. Members, is another matter. There has been an improvement, however, as Chairmen of Select Committees and equivalent bodies, including members of the Speaker's Panel, receive additional remuneration. The only people who do not receive such remuneration are members of the shadow Cabinet, who have to work extremely hard and are not paid properly for that work. However, that is an incentive to leave the shadows and enter Government. I hope that everyone accepts the case for staging, which is the subject of the motion.

May I deal with the two motions on payment for Chairmen of the Select Committee on the Crossrail Bill, both of which make the same proposition? The House decided to introduce payments for the Chairmen of the main Select Committees in 2003, following a debate in 2002 on the principle of payment arising from a report of the Modernisation Committee and from a subsequent report by the SSRB on the amount payable. In July 2005 we decided that that should be extended to nearly all the remaining permanent Committees. We decided, too, that a system of payment should be introduced for members of the Chairmen's Panel who chair Standing Committees.

The main purpose of the decision to pay Chairmen of Select Committees was to promote recognition of another career choice in the House as an alternative to service as a Minister. It reflected a recognition of the importance of Select Committees in underpinning a modern democracy, and a general agreement that the chairmanship of many Committees involves a heavy work load and substantial responsibility. The House would wish me to take the opportunity to say how much we value the work of Select Committees and to thank the various Chairmen for their commitment. The decision to pay Chairmen was by no means unanimous, but the House as a whole has shown that it supports the principle by subsequently extending the list of Chairmen who receive the additional salary.

Chairmen of non-permanent Committees have not been paid, partly because they do not fit the criteria as clearly as other Chairmen. By definition, such Committees are relatively short-lived, although the Select Committee on the Armed Forces Bill, which was ably chaired by my right hon. Friend the Member for Knowsley, North and Sefton, East (Mr. Howarth), has just reported after four months and more than 20 sittings. It would be difficult to identify in advance which Committees should be covered and which should not. However, where there is an exceptional case, I hope that colleagues agree that we should reflect that in arrangements for the payment of salaries.

The Select Committee on the Crossrail Bill appears to be such a case. It first sat on 13 December, and it sits up to four times a week when the House is sitting. Until last week it had sat on 36 days, so as it typically sits twice a day, it has many more sittings than other Committees. It may continue to sit—but perhaps not at the same rate—until the autumn. The House will agree that its work load is higher than that of many other Committees whose members are paid an additional salary. It is higher, too, than the work load of other ad hoc committees.

Undoubtedly members of Committees considering private legislation—the Crossrail Bill Committee is such a Committee—undertake an awful lot of hard work, but I find it difficult to distinguish the additional work by Chairmen from that of the membership, as they both seem to do exactly the same job in the same circumstances.

It could be said that assiduous members of Select Committees do the same job as, say, the Chairman of a Select Committee who happens to be coasting. There is no precise science. All Members who are doing their duties in the House work very hard—far harder, I may say, than they get credit for, regardless of party, from many sections of the press. But there is a difference between chairing a Committee and being a member of it. There is plainly a difference in responsibility. I hope, therefore, that the hon. Gentleman does not seek to make the best the enemy of the good, and will accepts that there is an exception to the general rule to be made here.

I express my gratitude to my hon. Friend the Member for Mansfield (Mr. Meale) for the work that he has done as Chairman of the Select Committee on the Crossrail Bill. Had he simply been coasting, had he not been taking his responsibilities seriously, I would not have tabled the motion and Members on both sides would not have accepted it. I accept that to add this Committee to the list of Committees whose Chairmen receive an additional salary will set something of a precedent. We will have to look at other cases as they arise, and it is not inconceivable that another Select Committee on a Bill may at some future point justify similar treatment. However, I do not envisage that we will have for some time another ad hoc Committee involving the work commitment for its Chairman that that one involves. It is a matter for the House to decide, but I think it is right to put the motion forward to provide an opportunity for the Chamber as a whole to make that decision.

I support all three motions before the House relating to Members' salaries and the pay of Chairmen of Select Committees.

I am grateful to the Leader of the House for having recognised that the staging of Members' pay does not in itself constitute a very large saving for the Government. However, as others, with whom we have been compared and linked in respect of the decision on our pay, are being asked to take their pay in stages, it is appropriate that we undertake the same level of restraint as we expect of them.

The Leader of the House referred to the wider issue, partly in response to a question from my hon. Friend the Member for Macclesfield (Sir Nicholas Winterton). The pay of Members of Parliament is a difficult matter, with which Governments and Members have grappled over the years. We have not necessarily found the best way to deal with Members' pay. It is Members who vote on our pay, and voters raise questions about it. They are often encouraged in that by members of the press, whose salaries are not revealed to the electorate or to their readership.

There is an issue that we need to address, and the SSRB triennial review will consider the wider aspects when it reports. I am grateful to the Leader of the House for clarifying that that will be commissioned later this year and will report next year. The question asked by my hon. Friend the Member for West Worcestershire (Sir Michael Spicer) is important, concerning the mandatory nature of that report. The report is not produced at the whim of the Prime Minister; a resolution was passed that a triennial review should take place.

The resolution is cited on the Order Paper; it was motion 14 at the time.

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that clarification. I am sure the Leader of the House has noted the point and the motion number, to ensure that the process goes ahead and there is no way that the triennial review can be stymied by a prime ministerial decision.

The wider issue is important. The right hon. Gentleman referred to the need to encourage high-calibre people to want to become Members of Parliament, and to the fact that these days this is a full-time job. That is not necessarily a view that will be shared by all my colleagues, or in other parts of the House, but my personal view is that it is a full-time job and we should treat it as such, as I have always done. That presents a challenge to those who are employed in areas where salaries are above those of Members of Parliament, which in the past may not have been the case. It is no longer the case that higher salaries are paid only to those in a significant role in business or banking, or who are barristers or in similar professions. A head teacher of a secondary school, for example, almost certainly earns more than a Member of Parliament.

Similarly, a superintendent of police.

I am grateful to my hon. Friend. There are a number of areas of employment where salaries are higher than those of Members of Parliament, which would not have been so in the past. People of very high calibre still wish to be Members of Parliament, but sometimes that involves them and their families making significant sacrifices to enable them to give their service to the country. We need to consider the issue.

I crave the indulgence of the House to raise one further point that cannot be accommodated by the SSRB triennial review, but which is a matter for all parties—the cost of standing as a candidate for election to Parliament. That can be a significant cost, particularly to someone nursing a seat for three or four years, if they are selected well in advance of an election. That presents a challenge to parties too, to ensure that we encourage high-calibre people to enter the House, as we are all keen to do.

On the pay of Chairmen of Select Committees, the right decision was taken by the House. It was an important step offering Members a different career structure, so that they do not have to become Ministers to feel that they are progressing and earning extra salary. The Leader of the House mentioned members of the shadow Cabinet. Having been a member of the shadow Cabinet since 1999, I, perhaps more than others, am conscious of the point. Members of the shadow Cabinet assume that burden with no extra pay over and above that of Members of Parliament.

The key issue is that the role of Select Committee Chairman offers an alternative career. In earlier exchanges during business questions, the Leader of the House referred to the introduction of the Select Committee system in the House. That has been one of the great strengths of the House over the past 25 years, and it is important that we recognise the value of that through the pay of Chairmen of Select Committees.

On the Crossrail Bill, I entirely understand the intervention by the hon. Member for Somerton and Frome (Mr. Heath) about the fact that all the members of the Committee take on a substantial burden because of the number of meetings of the Committee. I say openly and honestly that I would not like to be a member of that Committee. I intend to give evidence to it because Crossrail affects my constituency, but it is a detailed issue and a significant burden to meet and take so much evidence from those who have submitted petitions against the Crossrail Bill.

It can be argued that for members of any Select Committee there is a burden if they do their job assiduously, which I know members of Select Committees do, but the Chairman of such a Committee has an extra burden to bear, and it is appropriate that the Select Committee on the Crossrail Bill be added to the list of those whose Chairmen who are paid. The Leader of the House made a valid point when he said that we cannot guarantee that in future other Committees will not need to be added. Now that he has finally been allowed to become Chairman of the Modernisation Committee, after a little local difficulty, he will know that, as became clear from the evidence taken yesterday, one of the current issues concerns the role of Select Committees, Standing Committees and Special Select Committees in the future. If the Modernisation Committee proposes changes to the way in which the House handles legislation and the legislative process, so that the balance between Select Committees and Standing Committees and their various responsibilities evolves, we may need to look again at the whole question of whom it is appropriate to pay.

I welcome the fact that Select Committee Chairmen are now paid—that has been an important move for the House—and I endorse the adding of the Chairman of the Crossrail Bill Committee to the list of those whose salary is increased in recognition of the extra work that they are doing.

It is always difficult when we discuss our own salaries and emoluments in this House. I must admit that many hon. Members whom I number among my friends and acquaintances regret the fact that it falls to me to speak from the Liberal Democrat Front Bench on such matters, because I have something of a reputation for taking a puritanical view of them. Indeed, I am very clear that in fact and in perception we must be extraordinarily careful that we do not seem to be giving ourselves preferential treatment above those who serve in the public service or the private sector beyond this place. For instance, when we discussed the enhancements made to the pensions of right hon. and hon. Members, I was opposed because I felt that it was a clear example of an occasion when we were protecting our interests rather better than we were able to protect those of many other people.

I share the hon. Gentleman's concern, but if I remember the options on the pension correctly, one could either take it or increase it. What did he do?

I did not take it, but that is neither here nor there. I do not want to parade that as an example of virtue—it was simply the way that I felt about the issue.

We must also, however, be fair to Members of Parliament. We have to reflect the comparators that are set down and ensure that Members' salaries are commensurate with the responsibilities that they take on. It worries me when Members' pay falls way behind those comparators. I agree with the right hon. Member for Maidenhead (Mrs. May) that the job of a Member of Parliament should be to represent people in this place, not to go off and do some other job down the road. It always surprises and sometimes shocks me when somebody leaves high office, or even shadow responsibilities, and the first thing that the newspapers say is, "What job is he going to do now?" The answer is the job of a Member of Parliament, which is still their prime responsibility. It worries me that so many Members feel the need to top up their salaries in all sorts of ways. I cannot believe that that is to the advantage of their constituents. Of course, every individual has to take a view for themselves.

The Leader of the House cited the quality of the recent intake of Members. I agree. I think that we had an extraordinarily talented intake on both sides of the House this time.

Hear, hear.

Even the hon. Gentleman who says, "Hear, hear", whom I perceive to be one of the new intake, will recognise that we have had some very talented individuals joining us. However, although that may be a seductive argument for saying that we can therefore allow market forces to do their work and allow salaries to dwindle, it is wrong. It would be a complacent view, and an unfair one. Greater self-sacrifice is required, not only by Members but by their families, which is sometimes inappropriate. Having for several years led a county council with an annual turnover of about £500,000 on the basis that total expenses were about £4,000 per annum, I know how difficult it is to make such sacrifices in order to achieve one's political objectives.

All the difficult questions that the hon. Gentleman is posing are surely meant to be sorted out by the Senior Salaries Review Body. Would not the answer be for us simply to accept its recommendations?

That is by far the simplest way of dealing with it, and it takes the matter out of the political argument, which is as it should be. I would hope that it takes an objective and independent view, not one clouded by the misconceptions of bundling up all our office expenses—for example, staff and computers—into our salary and saying that they are perks for the individual concerned. All those factors are removed from the equation and we have an objective view.

I entirely support the contention of the Leader of the House in the first motion. Given that the Government have determined that civil service pay should be staged, it would be wrong of us to seek an advantageous position, and we should accept that recommendation.

That brings me on to the payment of the Chairman of the Select Committee on the Crossrail Bill. I have genuine problems with that. I hasten to add thatthat has nothing to do with either the person orthe qualities of the hon. Member for Mansfield(Mr. Meale), and everything to do with the apparent lack of discipline and control over the process—a process that I generally welcome. Those who chair Select Committees of the House undertake a very substantial job and generally do so with a great deal of assiduity and sheer hard work. I can readily accept that there should be a career structure within the House and that it should be rewarded, but I have always been reluctant for it to be greatly expanded. I agree with the right hon. Member for Maidenhead that we are rapidly approaching the situation whereby the only people who will not be paid extra are those who do a great deal of the work of the House by speaking from the Conservative and Liberal Democrat Front Benches on each and every Bill and attending Standing Committees to speak as required, and do so without any extra emolument at all. I hasten to add that I am not seeking that extra emolument, but merely pointing out that it is a rather perverse situation.

We now have payments for the Chairmen on the Chairmen's Panel who chair our Standing Committees. Again, I do not argue with that. It is a gradated structure. However, naming a specific temporary Committee sets an unhelpful precedent. The motion makes no provision—although it is clearly implied—that the payment should cease at the point at which the Select Committee reports. However, I have a more substantial objection. I do not know whether the hon. Member for Mansfield is a member of the Chairmen's Panel—if so, he is receiving a payment as such—but I suspect that he is not. That is surprising. Hon. Members who are put on a Select Committee on private legislation undertake a truly horrendous task. It is very time-consuming and difficult work that is usually, frankly, given as a punishment by the Whips Office for some misdemeanour, and I have the greatest sympathy for those who undertake it. But the fact remains that that hard work is shared by all the members of the Committee. It is not like being the Chairman of a departmental Select Committee. Those Chairmen do a tremendous amount of work outside the Committee, meeting individuals, preparing for meetings and guiding the reports that the Committee produces. They do a whole array of further work, but I do not believe that that is the role of the Chairman of a private Bill Committee. The work of those Committees is shared by all their members.

I do not intend to show any disrespect to the hon. Member for Mansfield, who I know is doing very good job of work, but he is not there all the time, and I believe that up to four other Members have also chaired that Bill Committee. So it seems odd to reward only one member of the Committee, quite substantially under the terms of this provision, for doing that temporary job. Furthermore, it is not clear to me from my reading of the resolution whether this is an annualised payment in line with those of other Select Committee Chairmen, on whether there is a pro rata element related to the timing of the Bill. It would be helpful to know that.

I do not know whether the hon. Gentleman will take my intervention as confirmation of his theory about punishment. May I tell him that I was asked, although not instructed, to sit on the Committee on the Crossrail Bill? However, I declined the invitation.

As I have no idea of the hon. Gentleman's present relationship with his Whips, I cannot possibly comment. I know that my hon. Friend the Member for Southport (John Pugh) was certainly not given his post as a punishment. He is there as a willing conscript, although he might now be regretting having been prepared to take on those responsibilities.

How was the Chair of the Crossrail Bill Committee chosen? Was he chosen by members of the Committee, or was the decision made through the usual channels? This is an important issue when we are talking about Members of Parliament getting a very substantial additional sum tacked on to their salary.

The hon. Gentleman has asked an extremely important question. No doubt the Leader of the House will be able to answer it when he responds to the debate. If there was a genuine election within the membership of the Committee, that would be one thing. However, if there was an instruction to the effect that someone had been favoured with the chairmanship of the Committee and was to receive a substantial emolument as a result, that would change the view of the House on what exactly is going on. For all those reasons, I really need to be convinced that this is a sensible way forward.